Peace Like a River

Jeremiah Land is Reuben’s father and a supporting main character. His role in the narrative is to guide his family toward God’s will. He is portrayed as a faithful disciple and through his sacrificial death becomes symbolic of Jesus Christ.

Jeremiah’s complexity as a character is supported by the fact that the narrator is not privy to his thoughts; in fact, he is protected from them due to his youth. Unaware of the reasons behind many of Jeremiah’s actions and decisions, Reuben can only tell the reader what he observes, making the reader see him as they must see anyone in real life. Jeremiah’s reaction to being carried by a tornado is a strong example. As Reuben says, “Dad’s response was to leave his prosperous track and plunge his hands joyfully into the sewer. An explanation is beyond me” (55). The mysterious nature of how God leads Jeremiah contributes to Reuben’s awe and admiration of his dad.

Humble clothing, a humble home, and a humble job as a janitor abundantly characterize the humility of Jeremiah’s character. His appearance changes over the span of the narrative, becoming thinner and frailer due to illness, a visual portrayal of the sacrifices he makes for his family. Jeremiah’s actions consistently characterize him as a man of great faith. He prays often, chooses God’s will over his own, and is chosen as a conduit for God’s miracles.

Reuben’s narrative interpretation of Jeremiah, influenced by a heroic image of his father not uncommon for a young boy, may provide an overly positive portrayal of Jeremiah’s character. His only apparent flaws seem to be related to his health, as he’s weakened by pneumonia and migraines. His former wife saw his lack of career ambition as a flaw, but the events of the story contradict this view and show instead how it demonstrates his devotion to God’s will.

Swede Land is Reuben’s younger sister and a supporting main character. She contributes much of the story’s nostalgic atmosphere with her love of old westerns, outlaws, and frontier tales. Her writing and worldview add a dramatic flair to the events in the narrative. She fits the character archetype of the outlaw, someone with a fierce and untamed spirit, in tune with her intuition, sure of herself and what she wants, and who challenges the status quo.

Swede is largely characterized by Reuben’s narrative interpretation. He admires her passion and intelligence, saying, “Swede and I rarely quarreled, for I never held opinions in those days, and hers were never wrong” (5). He doesn’t seem to hold her stubbornness against her, though his description of it makes her a more authentic character. Being overly dramatic and at times a bit judgmental could also be considered character flaws, though she has relatively few for an eight-year-old, and perhaps none in Reuben’s eyes.

Actions also demonstrate Swede’s character and confirm Reuben’s assessment of it. For example, he says, “For an eight-year-old girl she put enormous stock in courage” (9). Swede proves this when she insists on chasing an angry goose during the family hunt and when she searches the house for her dad’s shotgun during Waltzer’s attack instead of hiding. This determination to be courageous and her fascination with tales of the Wild West and its charismatic outlaws are significant influences on her interactions with the world. Within the story’s main conflict and narrative arc, her primary motivation is to find and rescue her brother Davy.

Davy Land is Reuben’s older brother and a supporting main character. He demonstrates qualities of an antihero, someone who opposes society’s definition of heroism and goodness. His lack of remorse for his crimes and unwillingness to fake it for his trial endorse this view. He fits the character archetype of the outcast, banished—or in his case made a fugitive—for a crime against his fellow man and destined to wander from place to place.

Davy’s character is complex, and his actions are never easy to define as good or bad. He does undergo change due to the events of the narrative, but not a reversal or transformation in the traditional sense. Instead, his character traits are reinforced, his flaws more entrenched. He’s hardened by being a fugitive, from an original state that was already detached and leaning toward isolation.

Reuben sees Davy as being already a man at the age of sixteen, with “Dad’s own iron in his spine” (5). Reuben admires Davy’s stoicism, his quiet strength, and his practicality, but is troubled by the growing distance he senses between Davy and the rest of the family. When they’re hunting, a thought comes to Reuben “that Davy was hunting alone—that Dad and Swede and I weren’t even there, really; that we existed with him as memories, or fond ghosts watching his progress” (13). This sense of distance foreshadows the permanent rift of Davy becoming a fugitive.

Shooting Finch and Basca triggers the conflict surrounding Davy’s exile and evokes the situational archetype of the fall, the descent from a higher to a lower state of being involving the loss of innocence. Davy is motivated in this by a sense of justice and society’s failure to enforce it to his standards. “How many times does a dog have to bite,” he asks, “before you put him down?” (36). In his view, society abides bullies and idly sits by while innocent families are victimized.

Once Davy becomes a fugitive, every decision and action is motivated by his desire to evade capture and remain free. The consequences often require sacrifices from him family. Davy’s actions never clearly reciprocate his family’s loyalty or sacrifice, but without seeing into his heart and mind, it’s up to the reader to decide whether he’s sacrificing more than is apparent, is selfish, or just misunderstood.

Israel Finch and Tommy Basca are the story’s early antagonists. They rarely appear individually and serve the same function in the narrative. These two teenage boys are high school dropouts who start a conflict with the Land family when they assault Davy’s girlfriend. While Davy initially labels them windbags and cowards who pose no real risk to the family, Reuben sees them differently. He says of them, “These two fellows were as serious a kind of trouble as you could purchase in Roofing back then. To call Finch and Basca the town bullies doesn’t touch it, as you will see” (14). This view foreshadows the main conflict and defines Reuben’s initial understanding of it.

Both their subsequent actions and previous actions revealed through backstory portray Finch and Basca as dangerous and malicious. While the assumption that they intended to rape Dolly can’t be proven, they did assault her. They threatened Jeremiah’s family, tarred his doorway in a manner symbolic of hate crimes, abducted eight-year-old Swede from her home, and ultimately died committing a home invasion.

The lesson Reuben learns regarding Finch and Basca is not that they were actually good or innocent, but that Davy played a role in making the situation worse and egging the boys on to greater crimes. He also begins to recognize how factors outside their control may have corrupted them, and how their deaths caused harm to their families.

Roxanna Cawley fits the character archetype of the caregiver, or someone who is nurturing and generous, compassionate, and driven to care and provide for others. Ultimately, in one sense, she represents a blessing God brought into the Lands’ lives, as she is a love interest for Jeremiah and a mother figure for the children. Reuben describes Roxanna in the following manner:

Big-boned, yes, but not in the cushiony sense people often mean; tall; dirt-road blond hair in a back-swung braid; windburned in the face. She looked like some woman from a polar dogsled expedition recounted in the Geographic. She looked, I would say, built to last (176).

This physical portrayal sets her up to fulfill the role of romantic interest without reducing the relationship to sexual attraction alone. Her characterization is somewhat flat, in that no real flaws are developed and the reader doesn’t gain an understanding of what motivates her. Roxanna’s generosity and capacity for nurturing are evidenced by her actions from the moment the Lands meet her. She invites them to stay at her place and makes them feel at home, willingly helps during Reuben’s asthma attack, and entertains them with stories to ease their burdens.

Like the Land children, Roxanna grew up motherless after her mom’s death when she was seven. She has an affinity for language and storytelling like Swede. She fits right in with the Land family, and Reuben considers her a wonderful gift from God—exactly what they wanted and needed.